


the thread that binds can also tear

by andibeth82



Series: minds without fear [2]
Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Character Study, Clint Needs a Hug, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, F/M, Implied Sexual Content, Natasha Feels, POV Natasha Romanov, Partners to Lovers, Psychological Trauma
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-03-02
Updated: 2014-03-02
Packaged: 2018-01-14 06:31:00
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,235
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1256305
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/andibeth82/pseuds/andibeth82
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>They are not a standard for partnership – they are a model, but not in the way that the pamphlets phrase, two smiling bodies in S.H.I.E.L.D. issued clothing proclaiming that nothing is impossible.</p>
            </blockquote>





	the thread that binds can also tear

**Author's Note:**

> Subtly implied mentions of knife play, BDSM, emotional trauma. (These are dark people.)
> 
> Thank you to [bobsessive](http://bobsessive.tumblr.com) and [enigma731 ](http://www.archiveofourown.org/users/enigma731) for beta and support.

She is ten when she names her first pet, a dog named Zvezda; she is ten when she meets her first real friend, a girl named Yelena, who plays hand games with her in the dark, under the bed where monsters can’t lurk. She is ten when they have her spill innocent blood, she is ten when she cries for the first and last time over the loss of a life, she is ten when she learns of deception, when hand games turn into knife games, when pattycake turns into cruel and unusual torture.

He is twelve when he picks up his first weapon, a crudely strung bow and arrow that he fashions out of wires and rope he finds in the back of the garage, he is twelve when he realizes for the first time that perhaps not all love is perfect. He is twelve when he receives his first backhand across the face, he is twelve when he learns the smells of whiskey and rum, he is twelve when he realizes that he can be hurt, that there are things other than words or touch that can break the walls of someone’s soul.

She is fifteen when they meet for the first time, him pandering in a dark alley and her with a knife to his throat. Their scuffle for survival brings them both to their knees and she draws blood against the back of his hand – _not the first time_ , she says, grinning at his pain, _and not the last_ – and he hates her for who she is, for what she does, for everything she represents. He is twenty when they meet again, him a hardened soldier, her still an outcast with blood on her hands and debts on her soul.

She is twenty-five when it all catches up to her, when he corners her and tells her that he’s no longer willing to fight, that instead, he has plans for something better. He is twenty-seven when he finally breaks her, makes her admit that she’s tired of running, when she gives in and signs away her life to a partnership that she’s told will help amend the years of red.

She is twenty-nine when she gives him her life, literally, defying protocol and sharing what she can of her own blood because _you need to live, you stupid idiot, and I can’t do this alone_.

He is thirty when he repays, and, he thinks, holding her shaking body to his own, he would give her all his breath if he needed to, if that was ever a price he had to sacrifice to give her more chances than she felt she deserved, because _you taught me to breathe when I didn’t know how, and I share your life with mine, now and always._

She is thirty-one when she finally admits it out loud for the first time, drawing marks of possession over his body with the same knife that once drew his blood in a dark alley. This time, she bandages the cuts she makes with full care, dressing his wounds and kissing them gently and in the heat of the moment that exists between them she whispers _you are mine_ and it’s something that’s new and different and he’s never been someone else’s before, never knew he could be, until now.

He is thirty-three when a god arrives out of nowhere and makes him do terrible things, brainwashes his soul and leaves him hungry for guilt and regret and things he cannot and will not overlook.

He is thirty-three when he forgets how to exist.

 

***

 

There is a space between them – it is not long and not short, it is not measurable by a ruler or time or any one of those goddamn fucking concoctions that he knows exists on another planet. (Yes, that is a thing now, he reminds himself, there are other planets and gods and people that for whatever reason find it _fun_ to bend people to their will.) There is a space between them, and it hurts, it fucking hurts and it hurts the most when he tells her about it, when she forces him to admit the things he doesn’t want to say.

She knows this space, she tells him, and she wants to close it, wants to bring them back to what they were and not who they came from. She says this and he looks at her with half-lidded eyes, shakes his head, lips pursed in _I can’t_ until he can, because _I believe in you and yes, you can._

They are not a standard for partnership – they are a model, but not in the way that the pamphlets phrase, two smiling bodies in S.H.I.E.L.D. issued clothing proclaiming that nothing is impossible. They are two broken parts of a whole, who somehow are able to find enough jagged pieces of each other to start fitting themselves back together - a hawk without a wing and a spider without a leg, a constant work in progress that is not black and white, but rather, mostly gray.

(And fuck anyone who thinks differently, that they don’t work, that they’re not _standard_ because they’re strong, and their brokenness makes them stronger.)

They tie their pasts together the same way they tie each other to their beds, wrapping strands of rope around bruised flesh, securing their trust in words and actions that would have, years ago, been unforgivable.

They share other strands of themselves when they need to, what is necessary to get them through the day, or through a mission, or through a moment where one needs to keep the other alive until they have an extraction team at their disposal. They are entwined in that way, in a way that they cannot explain to anyone else, in a way they don’t want to explain to anyone else, in a way that, in some sense, simply _is_ indescribable.

They are taught to curb their demons - they are told that they might find comfort in thoughts and not words, in saying and not doing. But they have found a balance, he thinks, somewhere between existing and not existing, somewhere between healed and still broken, in not talking about their feelings, in simply being. They have found this in their memories and in their understandings and in the way they hold each other, when things get bad, and when they eventually get worse.

 _I love you_ , he whispers, and _I love you_ , she says back, and there are so many lies hidden in truths but this is the only one that they can believe is genuine, the only one that they can hold onto as being real. _I love you_ , he says when he’s holding her down, his hands on her leg, and _I love you_ , she says back, arching into him, her body begging for him to own her.

 _I will always be here_ , because she will, and she needs him to know and believe it. _I will never leave you_ , because he won’t, and he needs her to know and believe it. They give each other wings and legs to help each other to stand and fly, until they are finally in sync, a jagged line close to something smooth, a rhythm of a tone that for so long beat like an unsteady drum, that now sings a constant and undisturbed tune.


End file.
